In the era of new emergent technologies, is present an increasing need to conceive systems for applications and services, in particular for generic servers based on simple protocols for implementation and use, with features for interactive, intuitive, easy to use navigation (or browsing), and also with a fast integration.
To these characteristics are added the “scalability” requirements (relative to the word “scalability”, which indicates the property of re-dimensioning of a system or a method respectively in term of components or steps, of quality, size, resolution, band-width or the like).
However, the constraint of the costs in material and human resources for the set-up of such systems is important. The technical problem to be solved is thus to conceive a system for applications and services, allowing with the lower possible costs, the set-up of multiple and reusable applications and services, targeting the mass market. The problem is also to fulfill the increasing requirement to have interactive compatible services between existing and emergent technologies, without expensive implementations concerning the systems for applications and services, and preferably, with little or no modification of the equipment of the telecommunications network operators, said operators (also referred to as “services providers”), of third parties and of end users. A major aspect of this technical problem is how to provide interactive services and applications with dynamic content over any communication channel, and thus, over any telecommunications network.
The present invention is positioned in the area of the conversational applications and client-server applications, more particularly in the field of the dynamic dialogues between a terminal and a server for applications and services, using interactive interfaces, giving the ability to reach, dialogue, exchange information and use different applications and services.
The present invention is positioned in particular in the area of mobile telephony, in a context of expansion of new features, addition of interactive services, convergence of the means for dialogue and communication by using multiple communication channels between heterogeneous devices, such as mobile phones, mobile equipment, digital platforms for applications and services, Internet servers, third parties services and equipment, and others.
In the present invention, the term channel refers to a device or a medium for users to reach and to use network services, and for the network operator to reach the users. A device is, for example, an access gateway and/or a network gateway and/or any gateway or a network, enabling specific protocols for interactive communication in a push and/or pull mode. A medium can be a physical transmission medium such as a wire, or a logical connection over radio waves, used to bear information signals.
In order to answer these problems, the prior art uses various approaches that address only restricted and specific aspects of these problems, without proposing complete services such as navigation in various menus, provided from various applications, use of standard protocols, or use of already available means in the devices, as standard, natively implemented functionalities without significant modification of the digital servers or the end users' equipment.
French patent No. FR2857816, relates to a method for implementation of communication, disclosing a group that includes vocal communications, WAP (“Wireless Application Protocol”) or MMS (“Multi-media Message Service”) on a mobile phone. In the communication method, a preliminary step consists in offering to the user the possibility to activate or not activate such communications. The choice to activate or not activate such a communication is proposed to the user by a USSD (“Unstructured Supplementary Service Data”) connection. Nevertheless, the referenced document is limited to the establishment of a connection for activation via USSD of telephone voice communication, without teaching aspects of architecture, or implementation of navigation and other auxiliary services.
Another patent document is EP0986275, which relates to a method of transactions for ordering consumer items or services using a mobile phone. The order is transferred to a service provider on a mobile phone network. Some order data, in which a billing is indicated, are encapsulated in one or more short communications, such as SMS (“Short Message Service”, short textual message being able to be emitted and received by a cellular phone), USSD or e-mail. These data are transmitted to a validation platform, and connected to a company central for short term communications. The cost of the indicated services is taken from a user account, and is transferred to a service provider account.
However, this document relates foremost to aspects of a specific transaction, based on existing protocols, without addressing the problems of interactive USSD navigation systems or architecture for USSD equipment in common use.
Another patent document is WO/2007/030413, which is addressed to a control channel for a VXML browser (“Voice eXtensible Markup Language”, language voice extended tagging, which means an application programming interface for communication using peripheral devices related to the speech synthesis and telephony). This document focuses on a system that allows external applications to interact with a VXML browser running on a processor based on a VXML interpreter. A control is functionally positioned between the external application and the VXML interpreter using a communication channel. The control inserts into the VXML interpreter instructions which are processed by the VXML browser in a conventional manner, to allow the external application to interact with the VXML browser.
However, this document is limited to interpretation and to VXML browser capabilities and their adaptation to a transport channel with standard protocols such as UDP (“User Datagram Protocol”, communication protocol providing for the exchange of a minimum of data across a network), TCP (“Transmission Control Protocol”, basic protocol for exchanging data over a network), or SIP (“Session Initiation Protocol”, standard protocol for initiation of an interactive network session).
Therefore, this document does not resolve the technical problem outlined in the present invention, namely, navigation in non-voice services such as USSD and others, and issues related to the specificity of the implementation and the integration of such navigation.